


You Give Love a Bad Name

by ClassicRockInTheTardis



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Charlie Bradbury & Dean Winchester Friendship, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Death, Emotional Constipation, F/F, F/M, Family Fluff, Impala Makeouts, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-13
Updated: 2014-10-13
Packaged: 2018-02-17 06:39:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 13,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2300054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClassicRockInTheTardis/pseuds/ClassicRockInTheTardis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hermione Granger comes home one day from work to find her entire life turned upside down while across an ocean the Winchester's tackle their strangest case yet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> DEAD FIC

Chapter 1

“Kids, I’m home!”

Hermione Weasley stood in the doorway to her flat in London where she lived with her husband and two children. She pulled her frizzy hair out of its messy bun – it wasn’t doing her any good at any rate in the afternoon heat of the summer. There was no answer from upstairs, but Rose was surely working on schoolwork, and Hugo had been trying to figure out how to make an Xbox work in a magical environment. Ron, her husband, wasn’t home yet. Aurors had to work late during that week. A couple of families had been killed by their own family members who later said they couldn’t control their actions. The Ministry suspected the Imperious Curse but was yet to arrest the caster.

Hermione headed down the hall to the master bedroom. She changed out of her work robes into a pair of fraying shorts and an old white T-shirt with fading lettering. She pulled her hair back into a bushy ponytail and stuck her wand in her back pocket. It was just too hot for anything else.

She wandered into the kitchen and scrounged around in the fridge for leftovers for dinner. After sticking some cold pizza in the over for the kids and day-old casserole in the microwave for her, Hermione called upstairs, “Rose! Hugo! Five minutes until dinner!”

There was silence, which was unusual. Normally Rose would yell back or Hugo would beg for five more minutes playing whatever he was into these days. Hermione started down the hall, thinking they were probably giving each other the silent treatment over a petty fight that was not uncommon between the siblings.

Then she heard Rose scream.

As the shrill screech echoed through the house, Hermione raced up the stares and blasted the door open to the kids room, her wand already out and in her raised hand.

And then she froze in her tracks.

Hugo was lying on the floor in a pool of dark blood, his eyes staring glassily at the ceiling. Red blood, still fresh and shiny, splattered the yellow walls. Rose was slumped backwards on the chair at her desk, her throat slit like her brother’s. A figure stood over her, a knife in his down stretched hand, with blood like tar dripping off the bright red blade.

“NO!!!!!”

Hermione’s cry was bloodcurdling, but the figure calmly turned around, slowly and deliberately as if relishing her horror. As Hermione saw his face, she forgot how to breath and even think.

It was Ron. His blue eyes glinted with malice, free from any cloudiness or fog normally accompanying the effects of the Imperious Cures. His hands were dripping red and the sleeves of his robed were soaked with blood.

“Ron…” Hermione sputtered weakly, torn through so many different emotions, still unbelieving that this was actually happening and wasn’t just a horrible nightmare.

Before she could say anything else, Ron lunged towards her with the knife. Before he could reach her, Hermione unconsciously silently Disarmed him with an instinct burned into her after the war. But he kept coming at her even without the knife. Ron slammed her against the wall with more strength than any human should possess, splintering the plaster and causing her vision to go fuzzy. Hermione could feel the wet blood on the wall soaking through her shirt. Her children’s blood. Ron pinned her wand hand to the wall and pressed his forearm against her throat. Her feet dangled a few inches above the floor and she struggled to kick out in an attempt to strike him. Her brown eyes were wide, a flurry of fear, grief, and hatred.

Hermione screamed and finally managed to kick Ron in the shin. He didn’t even flinch. Keeping her pinned tightly against the wall, he stretched his hand out and the knife leapt into his palm. He smiled and dragged the flat side of the blade across her exposed throat. As the cold metal slipped over her skin sweaty from the summer heat, Hermione struggled not to fall into the flashback of an old torture. Another reminder of her time in the war.

“Well, well, well,” Ron mused. “Looks like the bitch is home after all. That’s good. I just hate leaving loose ends. It makes me ever so…irritated. And trust me, you don’t want to see me irritated. Besides, it’s my vacation. I hate having to work when I’ve taken sick time.”

“Ron…” She couldn’t manage to force anything else out. No other conscious thoughts could form.

“Hmm…” Ron cocked his head to the side as if contemplating her murmur. “Unfortunately for you, no. Ron has…temporarily left the building. Just me in this lovely meat suit now.”

He grinned, and then his eyes blinked pure black. Not a hint of white or color. Just an evil darkness. Black. Then they blinked back to Ron’s normal blue just as quickly.

Hermione’s head was spinning, awash with too many emotions, more than any person should have to bear. She was going to die. She knew that. If she couldn’t start thinking clearly, she was going to die today.

The thought was like dousing her with ice water. Knowing that her life was in clear, immediate danger was the electric spark Hermione needed to jolt her out of shock. Ron, or whatever the hell he was, had loosened his grip on her wrist as he was talking. Hermione closed her fingers firmly on the handle of her wand and with a sudden explosion kicked both her feet into Ron’s chest at the same time. He was pushed back and she dropped down from the wall, her blood soaked shirt peeling off the sticky paint and clinging to her back. She jabbed her wand towards Ron and he flew backwards, crashing into the opposing wall. It was enough force that should have knocked out any mortal being, but Ron, or the thing, or whatever, just looked mildly stunned. If anything, Hermione had just made him, it, whatever, mad. Before he even stood up, he flicked his hand towards her and she was slammed against the wall by an invisible force somehow he held her there as her quickly got to his feet.

“You stupid magical bitch,” he growled, his eyes staying completely black. “I should have killed you when I had the chance.”

A force was constricting Hermione’s throat. Her fingers scrambled to her neck, trying to pull off an invisible restriction. She could feel her vision going black, but she managed to raise her wand and send Ron slamming against the floor again. She dropped to the ground and before anything else could happen, she Apparated away to the only place she could think of that would be safe.

She ran to the basement of the decrept house and threw open the trapped door. She raced through the dusty tunnel as if hell itself was at her heels, dodging flailing tree branches as the warm air of the fading evening kissed her skin outside. Guided purely by ancient memories and instincts, she ran up the steps to the small hut and banged on the door. She was crying, her tears mixing with her own sweat and her children’s blood. A giant of a man opened the door, and she flew into him, barely even nudging him.

He seemed surprised and worried, but didn’t question her until he settled her down on a stool with a pot of tea on the stove. When he finally asked her what happened, Hermione wasn’t even sure if he completely understood the garble of words flying out of her mouth. Her story was intermittent with sobs and chokes and long pauses as she herself tried to make sense of everything that had happened.

When she was finished, the man was silent for a long while, until finally saying, “Ye know yer welcome to stay ‘ere as long as ye need to."

Hermione looked up at him with immense gratitude.

“Thanks, Hagrid.”

She had returned home, but it was in no way the way she had ever wanted to. Nothing would ever be the same, and nowhere seemed safe. Hogwarts was the safest place she knew. But how safe was safest after all that happened?


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Hermione woke up drearily the next day. She was disoriented and felt like something was terribly wrong, but couldn’t quite put her finger on what. Then she remembered what had happened. The weight of the reality came crashing down on her all at once.

It was as if a brick came smashing into her stomach and she collapsed back onto Hagrid’s couch that she had slept on the night before. It was worse than she could possibly imagine. People always say that grief hurts, and Hermione was no stranger to grief. She knew that it caused unspeakable pain. But this was different. This was less of a mental sadness and more of simply a physical anguish. She felt like she was under immense pressure, like a tin can crushed miles beneath the surface of the ocean. She was suddenly damp with sweat but shivering at the same time, feverish and nauseous with a hundred burning grains of sand encroaching on her physical heart so that each beat seemed strained. It was so much more than just a sadness or a grief. It was an actual physical pain, more intense than anything she had ever felt bore, even worse than the time being tortured at the Malfoy Manor all those years ago.

She cried out, partly from the sudden pain, partly from the sudden remembrance. As the pain in her body subsided until just her heart ached, she shattered and started crying. Not a panicked wail or an unconscious mass of tears, but properly crying. For her children. For her husband. For her and the world she once knew to be permanent and solid and real. She just let it out and cried. 

Hermione felt someone next to her, dipping the couch so much that it could only be one person. She was enveloped into two giant arms and she leaned into Hagrid’s hug, crying on his shoulder like how she used to cry on her mom when she was five and scraped her knee. Hagrid just sat there, holding her and keeping her anchored. 

She kept crying until she couldn’t cry any more. Hagrid’s coat was soaked; it could have been wrung out and still have been damp. She continued to choke and sob for a few more minutes after the tears had stopped, gulping down air only to have it expelled from her lungs seconds later.

Finally, the last of her heaves subsided. Hagrid gave her a consoling squeeze (almost suffocating her in the process) before wrapping her in his moleskin coat and going to the kitchen to make tea.

Hermione sat at the kitchen table as Hagrid grabbed two mugs from the cupboard. The tea was tasteless to her, even though she was well enough acquainted with the sharp flavor from her visits when she was a teenager to know it should make her eyes water. She sat there, just staring into her cup, not really thinking about anything. Just feeling empty.

Hagrid sat down next to her with a thud that shook the whole hut.

“Now,” he said, “I ain’ gonna sit here an’ tell you it’ll all be all right. You know ‘swell as me that just ain’ true.”

“What do you know about this?” Hermione asked, not unkindly, but not quite thinking either.

“I lost me dad and me mum, if you remember,” Hagrid replied sympathetically. “O’ course Dumbledore was fam’ly too, but all o’ us lost him years ago. I’ve known my share of heartache. Nothin’ like what yer goin’ through, but I know ‘bout grief. What I’ve learned is you gotta have a plan. Somethin’ to do to get you goin’ from day to day. Somethin’ to keep yerself busy. Somethin’ to live for. A purpose.”

Hermione looked up from her rapidly cooling tea. “Like what?” she asked, both genuinely curious and desperate some anything to help.

“Well, when me dad died, I had to finish school. ‘Course that never happ’ned, but it was still me goal. When I found out ‘bout me mum’s death, I had that mission with them giants to worry ‘bout. An’ Dumbledore…that was right before the war wasn’ it? We all had things to do then.”

“So what do I do?” Hermione pleaded, lost and desperate. “What is there possibly left for me out there?” She was barely able to get the words out. “I can’t trust anyone. I…I don’t know what to do.”

“Start by finding Ron.”

“No!” She flinched violently, the emotion so sharp that it exploded, blowing a window out above the sink. Hermione shrank back immediately. Magic hadn’t exploded out of her since she was ten and got a shoe thrown at her head during gym class.

“I’m sorry…I didn’t mean…it just happened, I’m sorry…”

Hagrid calmed gathered the bits of broken glass, not even acknowledging the fact that it had happened and sparing her from further embarrassment. 

“No I can’t see him ever again I can’t I can’t I can’t I can’t I can’t I just can’t no no no I can’t.”

“Hermione, you know ‘swell as me that wasn’ the Ron we know. That was somethin’ else. I dunno what, but that’s yer firs’ step. Find out what this thin’ is to stop it from hurtin’ more people.

“Also, warn yer fam’ly. Let them know what happened. I’ve gotten three owls already askin’ if I knew what had happen’d and if yer alright. I told them yer here with me but I know at leas’ Harry an’ Ginny are seriously concern’d.”

Hermione had completely forgotten about the rest of her family and friends in the whirl of events that had completely destroyed her life. She didn’t want to tell them. She didn’t want to relive those painful memories. But Hagrid was right. They should know. They cared about Rose and Hugo too, and they needed to know to protect their families in a way that she couldn’t protect hers.

And she knew Hagrid was right about something else too. That thing hadn’t been Ron. She didn’t know what it was, but it was still out there. Her family wasn’t the first it had struck. And it wouldn’t be the last unless she did something. She was the first person to escape from it alive. It was her job and her duty to hunt the damn thing down and kill it.

And she knew where to start. Where she could figure out how to find the thing. The place where she always started. Where she always found answers, whether it was what Dumbledore hid in the castle to how to destroy Horcruxes. 

The library.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Hogwarts was fairly empty this time of year. Hagrid lived there year round, but most teachers went home for the summer a few days after the students returned home. It was late August, so Hermione passed a few teachers in the hallways, ones readying their classrooms and gathering materials for the start of a new school year. Of course, all the ghosts remained as well. Hermione drew strange looks from a few as she passed them in the halls. Some of them recognized her and were curious to why she was there while others seemed merely annoyed that a strange adult was strolling around the school. Not wanting to run into more people she knew than she already had, Hermione cut off from the main halls and ducked into one of the secret passageways. She was vaguely reminded of sneaking around the half-empty castle with Harry and Ron, the memory sending another racking pain through her body.

When she reached the library, the doors were locked, but a simple nonverbal “Alohamora” worked as well as any key. She knew there would be nothing to help her in the general area of the library. Which meant only one thing.

The Restricted Section.

Hermione knew she was being silly, but it still felt wrong to her to venture into the Restricted Section without having purely academic motives with a signed note from a teacher even though she was well past her student years. Still, she remembered something Harry had told her, something about one of the books actually screaming when her opened it against the rules during his first year. But of course, that couldn’t happen now. She was a mature adult and had every right to any of the material in the section. She had seen and fought much worse in her years than anything those books could describe.

Her fingers ran over the spines of the old books, tracing the outline of the binding. It was once again grounding to find something so familiar in the chaos. Something that felt permanent and real after everything else that had previously felt that way had fallen away.

She never knew quite what she was looking for when she visited the library. She normally just started reading until she could figure out if the book could be helpful or not. It had worked in the past, so she grabbed the nearest book to her and pulled it off the shelf. It was bound in worn black leather, with yellowing pages, a stain on the front that looked disturbingly similar to unicorn blood, and that smell that only truly old books had. She opened it gingerly only to drop the book suddenly as an ear-piercing cry echoed from its pages, just as Harry said had happened to him. She closed the book, but it didn’t stop the screams, only muffled them slightly. 

Hurried footsteps advanced towards her. The peals of the book had not gone unnoticed for very long/ Hermione clutched her ears, trying to block out the sound as her head wanted to split apart simply to rid itself of the noise. She looked up as the footsteps grew to a sudden halt, surprised but not disappointed to see a familiar face.

“Neville!” she shouted over the din.

“Hermione, what the hell are you doing here?”

“How do you stop this thing?” she yelled, avoiding the question.

“Oh, right, sorry.”

Neville grabbed the still-screaming book, touched the tip of his wand to the cover, and muttered an inaudible spell beneath the noise.

Instantly, the clamor stopped and silence filled the library once more. It was only   
broken when Neville said,

“Sorry about that. The new librarian is even stricter than Madame Pince was. Anyways, why are you here?” He looked slightly abashed and hurriedly added, “I mean it’s great to see you and everything, its wonderful to see you, but it’s just a little…sudden.”

Hermione bit her lip, unsure of what to say. She didn’t want to lie, but she wasn’t ready to tell the story again when she hardly understood it herself. It was painful enough, she wasn’t going to retell it. She abruptly pushed the pain to the back of her mind, covering the grief and focusing on one thing: figuring out what had ripped her family apart. In that instant, she decided to tell Neville half the truth.

“I need information. There’s this…creature that’s been running around London for a few weeks. No one in the wizarding community has ever seen anything like it, and it’s certainly not a regular animal. This seemed like the best place to find out what it is.”

Neville, as caring as always, immediately offered his help in her research.

“I’m not as good at that sort of stuff as you, but I can at least offer an extra pair of eyes.”

Hermione hesitated again.

“Are you sure? You’re obviously here during the summer for a reason. Plants to attend to or something…” She trailed off, knowing it was a weak argument. 

“Of course I’m sure! I only came in today to water the bogroot and help Hagrid with fertilizer for his pumpkins. Both can wait. Besides, you need a teacher here is you’re going to want to read any of these books quietly. What sort of creature are we looking for?” he asked, already making his way to one of the end shelves and pulling down a large volume. 

Hermione resigned herself to the reality that she would have to tell Neville about the monster that possessed Ron, although deep down she was grateful for the company and relieved for the added safety. The Restricted Section had always been slightly eerie and after what happened, her nerves would never be the same again. She walked over to him, tilting her head so that she could read the pages he had opened the book to.

“There’s no much we know about it,” she said, trying to make it sound less personal. “We know that it’s killed a couple of Muggle families already. Each time the murders were committed by a close family member who said that they were forced to do it against their will. But it’s not the Imperius Curse like they, I mean we, first assumed. The thing possesses people. His, they’re, eyes turn completely black when possessed. No hint of white. Just darkness. Like the pits of hell themselves.”

Neville was staring at her strangely. He didn’t seem confused or even curious, but rather shocked and maybe even a little scared. 

Gravely, he said, “There only one thing I’ve ever heard of that’s anything close to what you described. And it’s no magical beast. It’s not from our world. I don’t remember much on it, but I know where the book is.”

Neville made his way to the very back of the Restricted Section, a place Hermione had visited maybe twice in her entire life. It was in a dark corner, despite the window, as if the dark nature of the books themselves were able to suck the light out of the room. Neville brushed a few spider webs away that wound their way across the spines of the books. A flurry of dust was released as he pulled the book from the shelf.

“As I’m sure you know, there’s a couple of beasts out there that possesses people that have that level of bloodlust. Some ghosts that become particularly violent have been known to possess people. Of course Wendigos are said to be formed when an evil spirit possesses a person who turned to cannibalism. But they’re only found in the North and become grotesque creatures, barely able to be classified as a humanoid. And of course, you have your classic shape shifters, the Leshy and all.”

As he spoke, he turned the pages of the leather bound book. Intricate drawings graced its pages with descriptions of each beast in careful calligraphy on the adjourning page.

“But there is only one thing that possesses its victims with those black eyes you described. They are rarely seen and this may be the first time one has ever been spotted in the UK.”

He finally stopped on a page. On the left side was a generic page. It could have been anyone. But the eyes were blackened in fully and the smile….Hermione pushed down the bile and memories as the face turned to Ron’s, with the eyes and the smile remaining exactly the same. She blinked until the horrid memory blurred and her sight returned to normal. On the right side was a short description, maybe four or five sentences tops. In the place where the creature’s name should have been listed was a blank line.

“It doesn’t have a name?” Hermione asked.

“We’re lucky I even knew about this. During the war, while you guys were off finding Horcruxes, a bunch of us in the DA started going through all the dark magic books we could find. Trying to see how we could defend ourselves. The Carrows loved it, thought we were learning how to use it. But that’s when I came across this. There’s no name because only a few have ever been spotted in Europe. I didn’t even believe they were real until now.”

“But how do you kill it?” Hermione questioned, her tone sharp from the underlying pain trying to make its way out of the back of her mind. She tried to cover the pain with her determination to kill the thing.  
“You can’t,” Neville said solemnly. “Well, not in any way I know. I’ve asked around out of curiosity and the only ones who have ever even heard rumors about them are Americans.”

“Americans?” Hermione said doubtfully. 

“Since this book was written, they’ve nicknamed them Continentals because the only people to have heard of them are from the United States. But personally, I’ve been talking to a few…acquaintances who have ventured off the beaten path and they seem to think that these things are de–”

Hermione cut him off before he could finish the word. “So these…Continentals…are only found in the US?”

“Well, maybe not only, but recently that’s where most apparent sightings have been. At least that was the case twelve years ago when my third cousins visited from…”

Hermione stopped listening.

“He said he was on vacation,” she murmured. “Meaning it lives somewhere else.”

“…out the bathroom window – wait what?” Neville asked suddenly. “Who said? What vacation? What do you…?”

His eyes widened suddenly in a gesture that could have been surprise, understanding, fear, pity, or any combination of them.

“Hermione, you don’t mean–”

“Thank you, Neville.” She cut him off once again. She gave him a quick hug. “Tell Hagrid I’ll be in touch and that he can tell the others if they’re asking.”

“Tell…Hagrid…? Hermione what are you going on about?”

Hermione started racing towards the library door. She had a plan. She had a destination.

“Don’t know anything rash!” Neville cried out after her. “Where are you even going?”

“America!” she yelled over her shoulder, hoping the sound wouldn’t be lost in her hair. “I’m going to America!”

And with that, she was gone.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

“So get this.”

Dean Winchester peeled his face off the table where he had fallen asleep the night before. He blinked, trying to adjust to the light and scratched the sand out of the corners of his eyes. His brother sat at the other end of the table, laptop open and whirring, a four pack of Starbucks coffee to his right. Dean slowly got out of his chair, stretching carefully as his back reminded him why beds are used for sleeping in, not wooden chairs that looked like they belonged in a courtroom. He yawned and ruffled his hair (hopefully) back into place as he leaned over the laptop.

“What you got for us, Sammy?”

Sam handed him a coffee, which Dean took with a grateful nod. 

“Carlisle, Pennsylvania. A family of five was brutally murdered a day ago. The police caught the guy this morning. He confessed even. The oldest son. 23, goes to the near by college.”

“I don’t see how this is our type of thing,” Dean said, quickly losing interest in the so called “case.”

“The kid says he was forced to do it. That something took over his body while he was trapped inside his head.”

“Kid’s just trying to save his bacon.”

“The cops reported the smell of sulfur at the crime scene. And when they caught the kid, ‘black smoke issued from his mouth,’” Sam finished, reading off the computer screen.

“I’ll drive,” Dean said, already heading to the bunker’s garage. “You dig up whatever dirt you can find on this Carlisle place. Anything at all that could be demonic in origin.”

Sam was already typing furiously, pulling up multiple screens on a few different browsers. Dean spotted federal seals on some pages while others were local newspaper clippings.

“Oh, and Sammy,” Dean said with a smirking grin flitting across his page. “If we’re going all the way out to Pennsylvania, I am stopping for pie.”

.........................................

“I can’t believe you wouldn’t let me stop for pie,” Dean grumbled as he flashed his fake FBI badge at to the nearest cop. He and Sam ducked under the crime scene tape still blocking off the deceased Atwood’s house. They both straightened their cheep suit jackets as they entered the house. 

Sam gagged, choking on the smell of the air. “Yeah, that’s sulfur all right.”

The house was a mess. Pictures were crooked on the walls, shards of mirrors and broken glass littered the floor, dried blood stained the walls a rusty brown, and bits of splintered furniture were scattered throughout the rooms. The beams from the boys’ flashlights cast strange shadows, giving the place an even more foreboding feeling. The whole place felt like it had been abandoned for years even though it had been less than 48 hours. 

Dean crossed to a window, dragging his finger along the edge. He held it up, showing his brother the pale yellow powder that coated the tip. They both turned away in affirmation, scouring the house for anything that might point to where the demon was headed. There were basically two types of demons in the world. The ones who worked for someone, and the freelance demons who would just run all over the place trying to cause havoc. The former always had some sort of master, whether it be Crowley, Lilith, Lucifer, or another big baddie. Dean suspected this demon was of the later kind. There was no discernable pattern, no motivation behind the carnage besides causing pain and death. But of course, killing innocent people was motivation enough for any demon. Dean knew that better than anyone after the last year.

He pushed the thought to the back of his mind. That was in the past. It didn’t matter anymore. It’s over, done with. All that mattered was getting the job done. Worrying about the past never turned out well. It always ended with a violent outpouring of feelings and more often then not, actual violence. He didn’t need to be remembering the past on a hunt. They were supposed to make him forget about the past, not remember it. 

Suddenly there was a huge crashing sound from upstairs, like someone had dropped a piano or his giant of a brother had broken through some rotten floor boards. He looked up, half expecting Sam’s legs to be dangling out of the ceiling. It wouldn’t be the first time. 

“SAMMY?! Are you alright!”

Sam came rushing in from another room, chocking on the dust that had shaken loose from the ceiling.

“What the hell was that, Dean?”

“Nothing good.”

Dean crept towards the staircase, instinctively handing Sam his flashlight, pulling the knife out of his pocket, undoing the safety on his gun, and pushing his little brother behind him. Sam automatically fell into his familiar place of peering over Dean’s head as the brothers advanced carefully up the narrow staircase, Sam ducking his head to avoid an overhanging. Dean pressed the tip of his gun to the nearest door and pushed it open with a bang, Sam following closely behind.

The inside of the room looked like it had been hit by a hurricane. Bits of wood and fabric littered the floor and furniture lay on its side. Swirling patterns of dust flitted in the beams from the boys' flashlights.

And in the center of the room stood two figures, coughing in the dust and waving their hands in front of their faces to clear the air. They were distinctly female, one wearing a slim cut leather aviator jacket, the other with long red hair left dangling in her face. The two turned around as they heard the boys enter.

“’Sup, bitches?”

Dean quickly lowered his gun as Charlie Bradbury rushed towards him, enveloping him in a hug that only a little sister could give. He pulled her head closer to his chest, not believing that it was really her. That his honorary Winchester was back. 

“You’re next, Sam,” she said over Dean’s shoulder. Sam laughed as she disentangled herself from Dean and squeezed Sam, her short head barely reaching his shoulder. 

Dean nodded to Dorothy and received a smile and a friendly nod back.

“What are you doing here, Charlie,” Sam asked in his classic curious way. “Not that we aren’t extremely pleased to see you, but we’re in the middle of a job and you’re standing in an abandoned house.”

“It’s the key,” Dorothy said. “We were lucky you weren’t in the car or we would have never found you. Going from this world to Oz is easy, but the other way around takes a lot of concentration. And generally a bit of demolition.”

Charlie grinned mischievously, and Dean could tell she was bubbling over with excitement. She was standing next to Dorothy now and the two kept looking back and forth from each other to the brothers.

“You. Spill girl,” Dean said to the redhead.

“Well…” Charlie said, dragging out her words for effect, “the reason that we’re here, other than the fact I wanted to see you two again, is that," she linked her arm through Dorothy's, "we're getting married!!"

"Finally!" Sam said as the girls held up their left hands, identical silver bands on their index fingers,

"'Finally?' You knew about this?" Dean demanded.

"It was obvious!"

Charlie smiled embarrassed but still pleased while Dorothy seemed truly happy for the first time.

Suddenly there was a thump from downstairs, followed by a gruff male voice.

"Check upstairs!"

"Son of a bitch!" 

Dean had completely forgotten about the civilians outside. They must have heard the crashing and come to investigate.

"Who is that?" Dorothy asked, all business again and ready to kick ass if need be.

"Cops," Dean said, still cursing himself for forgetting about them. "We gotta run. Sammy, you and Dorothy should head back to the bunker, see what you can dig up about this one. She knows the place, she may be able to help you find something. Charlie and I will quickly check out the other place, then follow you guys. Dorothy, can you use that key to get you and Sam out?"

"Of course. But how are you and Charlie going to get out?"

Dean smiled at how protective she was. 

"Don't worry. I'll take care of your girl. My baby's parked around back, we'll just sneak out the back door."

"I can take care of myself! As you might remember, I've saved both of your asses more times than I can count," she snapped wheeling on Sam and Dean. "And if my memory serves me, I rescued YOU from the witch's castle." 

That one was directed to Dorothy. She just smiled, then leaned down and kissed her fiancé hard. Charlie looked startled for a few seconds before giving in and kissing her back.

"Yes," Dorothy said, smiling as she pulled the redhead off her. "And were unconscious for a week afterwards. I want you back in one piece, okay?"

Charlie still seemed mildly befuddled as she stared at Dorothy. Dean wondered if that happened every time they kissed. 

"Only if I get that type of a kiss when I get back," Charlie said, coming back to her normal self.

"Mmm," Dorothy contemplated the request, and flirted back, "come back soon enough and you'll get more than a kiss."

"Umm, guys," Sam said, looking hysterically uncomfortable. "We really should be...uh...going now." 

Charlie stood on her tiptoes, giving Dorothy another quick peck and a wink before saying to Dean, "Lead the way," and racing out of the room before he could say a word, looking side to side down the hall like a spy from the movies. Dean shook his head and followed his little sister, hoping she wouldn't get herself into too much trouble.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

"Why are we here?" Charlie asked, whispering as Dean worked the lock to an old apartment building.

"The guy who was possessed lived here," Dean answered.

"I thought he lived at the place that Dorth and I crashed through."

"No that's where they were murdered. This is probably where the meatsuit got jumped," Dean grunted as the door swung open with a small click. "Gotcha."

The two of them cautiously entered the small apartment. Charlie switched on the lights, illuminating the dark foray. Dean wondered why he and Sam had never thought about finding the lights instead of searching via flashlights. The apartment was clearly a bachelor pad, with sleek modern kitchen appliances that looked like they had never been touched, a giant flat screen tv against the far wall, a recliner with a cup holder, and a white leather couch for "company."

"Even before this guy was possessed he was a douche," Dean muttered, getting an affirmative nod of disgust from Charlie. 

Suddenly the lights flickered and all three of them froze immediately in their search. They flickered again, staying dark for a few lengthy seconds where Dean wondered if they would turn back on. The temperature dropped suddenly, and Dean could see Charlie's breath. The door slammed shut. The two immediately regrouped into fighting positions, drawing their guns fluidly.

The bedroom door abruptly slammed open with a bang, a woman standing in the doorway, having kicked it in. She was dressed for combat, wearing worn jeans, a tight fitting cream t-shirt, hiking boots much like Dean's own. Her hair was tied back in a ponytail, frizzy bits falling out towards the back that she tucked behind her ear. Her brown eyes flashed dangerously, and Dean knew she was a hunter. 

"Can you see it?" the woman demanded, no trace of fear in her voice. She had a slight accent, almost British Dean decided, but like she was trying to cover her nationality.

"Who the hell are you?" Dean asked with equal demand.

She stared him down, almost like she was evaluating whether he was worth the effort. 

"Dean Winchester, I presume." 

Charlie looked stunned. 

"How does she know your name?" she hissed in Dean's ear. Not taking his eyes off the woman, he replied, "I've honestly given up guessing now, but they always do."

"If you value your soul, run. I only stunned it but it'll be back."

"Dean...maybe we should go. I don't know about you, but I value my soul quite a lot. The missus would not be happy if I returned without it."

"Not until we find out who she is."

The woman still hadn't looked away from Dean, not he her, like two animals trying to judge how much effort it would be to take the other one down. Suddenly she spun around, glancing back towards the bedroom, as the room got cold again.

"I told you to run!"

There was an edge of franticness to her voice, just enough that Dean believed her. He pushed Charlie towards the door, following quickly behind her as the strange woman pulled the door shut behind them. She pulled a stick out of her back pocket and tapped the doorknob.

"Won't hold it for long," she muttered almost to herself.

Charlie stood in amazement, her eyes sparkling with that light that Dean knew her brain was working 5000 miles an hour to put together all the pieces. The woman pulled something out of her jeans pockets, handing two pairs of red and blue 3D glasses to Dean and Charlie.

"They'll let you see bits of it," she explained, pushing them down the hall. "Learned that from an old friend. It's better than nothing."

Charlie let out a little screech as Dean crashed into her, sending her tumbling down the first flight of stairs. 

"CHARLIE!!"

"I'm okay!" she answered from underneath a pile of legs and hair. 

Dean helped her up and saw that she already had the glasses on. She brushed the hair out of her eyes and, peering over his shoulder, screamed.

The air had become deathly cold again, colder than any spirit Dean had ever encountered. And uneasy feeling came over him, along with a flood of memories. He could hear Charlie vaguely crying in the distance, but all he saw was a mass of red and black and bodies and loss, all the pain and horror of his life contained in a few brief moments. 

And just as quickly as the memories came, they subsided. They were still there, the pain of the past tugging at his head, but it was broken as if coming through over static. He glanced up the staircase and saw the strange woman holding her stick high against the air. A silver cloud, almost like a shield, was attached to the end, although he couldn't tell what she was shielding them from. 

Charlie pressed the glasses into his hands. She was staring up at the woman with a combination of horror, understanding, and almost...glee. He slipped the glasses on and saw what was horrifying her.

Fighting against the silver shield was a horrible figure. It was made out of swirling black mist fragments, a figure covered in a cloak and unlike any ghost or demon Dean had ever seen. The silver mist was repelling it, but he could tell it would break through. Even as he watched, the shield weakened.

"Go!" the woman cried, her accent distinctively British now, the traces of her control replaced with the basic human need for survival. "I'll hold it off as long as I can, but you have to run!!"

Dean didn't want to just leave someone to an invisible monster, but Charlie tugged on his sleeve, pulling him down the stairs. He was still in shock from the memories, weak from trying to hold them back in his mind. He could feel them pressing against his natural barriers, and he was terrified of what would happen if they broke through. He couldn’t lose control. Someone would get hurt. He didn’t want to find out who.

"Focus on a happy memory," Charlie insisted. "Trust me it'll help. Focus on the happiest thing you can to drive out the others." 

They broke through the doors of the apartment building out into the sunlight. The brightness blinded Dean for a second and in that moment of weakness some of the pain slipped through. He crashed to the ground, screaming, crying, remembering, clutching at his head as if he could pull the bad memories away. 

“DEAN!!”

He felt Charlie kneeling beside him, but he couldn’t see her. His eyes were open but all he could see was the blood and the bodies and the blades and the darkness. His fault. All of it. His fault. 

“Dean,” a voice insisted. “Dean, listen to me. Focus on something happy. The happiest thing you can remember.”

He gasped, still drenched with the memories. His skin was clammy and sweaty but the air was colder than he’d ever felt before. 

“Can’t…my fault…all my fault…all that death…”

“Remember your brother. Dean, remember your Sammy. That Fourth of July. You remember that? With the fireworks. Come on, Dean, focus on that memory.”

The fire in Dean’s eyes exploded into multicolored sparks as the fresh memory took hold. The fireworks bursting against the dark sky, the look of awe and joy on little Sam’s face when he was a kid, and again, the same fireworks against the same sky, the same look on his face but years later. He focused on it, covering the other memories with the image of his brother’s face completely carefree and happy, remembering what it felt like to be truly happy. 

Dean’s breathing slowed, his heart rate steadying. The red and black faded from his vision and he looked up into Charlie’s concerned face. She was still crying softly. He could see her holding back her memories. He didn’t know what she was focusing on but he suspected it was related to Dorothy. She angrily brushed the tears away from her face and forced a smile of relief as she saw him come out of the memories. Dean blinked up at her, wondering how he ended up kneeling on the asphalt. He kept the memory centered in his head, keeping the others carefully layered underneath it. He shakily got to his feet as Charlie turned back towards the door. She looked anxious, and Dean realized that the strange woman had never come out of the building. 

Just as he turned back to make sure Charlie was going to be okay, the woman burst out of the building, stopping right in front of Dean and Charlie, turning around to face the doors to the complex. The air grew colder still as the black figure glided down the stairs. Dean was hoping that the bright sunlight would deter it, as it did with some spirits, but instead the wind rustled and the sky darkened. Clouds condensed and blackened, and fog rolled in from the woods behind the building. It was like a scene out of a horror movie, the air deathly still but the wind still chilling Dean through his jacket.

He held on to the memory of his brother, all the moments where the happiness overpowered the pain. He focused on those feelings, trying to remember what hope and joy felt like to hold back the gory memories as the figure drew nearer. As it approached, the happy memories faded and the horrible ones started melting through. 

“How do you stop this son of a bitch?” he shouted to the woman.

“I’m trying!”

She muttered a few words under her breath. Twice she tried to raise the silver shield and twice it went out.

She cursed, “Damnit! Of course the only one I have trouble with has to be important.”

She shook the stick as Dean would shake a flashlight to get the batteries working, hitting it in the palm of her hand.

The hooded creature was only 15 feet away. Charlie’s breathing was accelerating, and Dean could feel the memories trying to break through. The air was heavy; when he moved he felt like he was wading through mud. He focused on the fireworks but instead of sparks flitting towards the ground, the flames melted into dripping blood, the joy on Sam’s young face merging with the tortured of hell and earth. Voices screamed in his ears, and he could feel the blood dripping down his arms. 

He didn’t know how it happened, it was all a blur of red and black and pain, but somehow Charlie ended up standing at the woman’s side. She was saying something to her, he couldn’t hear what, and the woman tried once again to raise the shield. For a brief moment, Dean thought she had succeeded, but the creature brushed it aside.

Dean fell towards the ground, not able to hold back the pain anymore. He reached out, trying to catch himself before painfully hitting the pavement. Instead of hitting the rough asphalt, his caught the woman’s arm. His knees buckled, and he hit the ground, still keeping a hold of the strange woman. The pain was overriding, and he could feel himself slipping into the darkness. Charlie was barely hanging on, her face streaming with tears, her jaw set in that stubborn manner than meant she was going to go down fighting. 

Dean looked up to the woman, his light green eyes meeting her dark ones. She looked just as scared as he felt, and he could tell she was hiding more pain than she would ever let on. He recognized the type from himself. As he stared into her eyes, he knew that she was the only one that could possibly fight this thing. He couldn’t see it anymore, the glasses had fallen off somewhere in the screaming, but he could feel it. 

He kept his gaze firmly fixed on hers and whispered one word. One word that he only used when he was out of all other options. When it wasn’t just his life on the line. When he had to get back to his brother.

“Help.”

Something registered in her face, he couldn’t tell what, but there was a flicker behind her eyes. She stared ahead determinedly, whispering a few words quietly, almost like a prayer. 

The tip of her stick glowed silver, and Dean thought she had succeeded in summoning the shield again. But this time, when the mist formed, it took the shape of an animal. He immediately felt the pain lessen and the memories retreat to the back of his mind, where he quickly covered them with his normal defenses. Charlie let out a startled, “oh!” as the woman sent the animal galloping ahead of her. The cold vanished, the fog melting into the ground, the wind turning warm and whisking the clouds away. The creature was gone. Dean couldn’t see it, but he knew in his gut that the silver animal had killed it. 

As the silver creature came running back to the woman, Dean could see that it was the shape of a large dog. A Golden Retriever. It ran over to the woman, sitting down in front of her feet. She bent down and petted its misty silver fur for a few seconds before it vanished. 

Dean stood up shakily, trying to regulate his breathing. Charlie had her face inside her T-shirt, probably wiping away the tears. As soon as he saw that she was alright, Dean spun around to face the strange woman. She wasn’t paying attention to the two of them, but was rather staring at the spot where the dog had vanished.

“Thank you,” Dean said. “Now, who the hell are you?”

The woman turned to him sadly. 

“You don’t need to know–”

Before she could finish, Dean had the demon knife in his hand. With a quick movement, he had stepped behind the woman, pressing the knife to her throat.

“Now, let’s try this again. Who. Are. You? Because I sure as hell need to know. The only one who could swing that kind of mojo is either an angel or a demon, and we haven’t heard much from the God Squad for months.”

“Dean, no!” Charlie yelled at him, still looking upset but in awe at the same time. “I know who she–”

Before she could finish, the woman spun around in a quick maneuver, flipping Dean over her shoulder so that he landed hard on his back. She plucked the knife from his grasp and pressed the tip lightly into his throat, stepping with one foot onto his chest to hold him down.

“Who am I?” she asked, her voice hardening immediately. “I’m someone that you’re going to help.”

“Why should I do that?” Dean demanded, angry at the fact that she had already beaten him. “You could be a monster for all I know.”

“Because I just saved your sorry ass. More than that, you’re soul is still intact. You should be thanking me.”

He just glared at her. She gave a small huff with an eye roll, resigning herself to the fact that she was going to have to reveal herself at least slightly.

“The name’s Hermione Granger. And I need your help killing the demon that destroyed my family.”


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

“So let me get this straight,” Sam said, handing Dean a beer from the fridge. “We have not only one, but two people who have literally fallen out of books in the old headquarters of a group of over enthusiastic librarians?”

“It does hold a certain irony,” Dean muttered sourly. 

“Actually,” Charlie piped up, her eyes awash with excitement and enthusiasm. “We have four.” 

Sam and Dean stared at her blankly until she elaborated, “You two. The Supernatural books. They’re still in publication and are quite popular online.”

“I don’t believe her,” Dorothy said calmly but with a hint of menace creeping into her tone. “There’s no such thing as Harry Potter or wizards or anything. They’re books, and that’s all.”

Charlie turned to her.

“But to most people, you’re just a story too, Dorth. Stranger things have happened. Besides, there’s no other explanation for this.”

As soon as Charlie disagreed with her, Dorothy’s eyes narrowed.

“Some sort of demon with a strange reading addiction. Maybe a schizoid shifter. Hell, it could even be a psychotic ghoul or something.”

Charlie shook her head passionately.

“No,” she said, simply but not unkindly. “I know Hermione. I know her better than I know a lot of people. And that woman out there is her. Everything was right. The hair, the accent, the personality. The spell work was accurate even, like the fact that she struggled with casting a Patronus. Sure, it wasn’t an otter but its clear she’s been through a lot, and I’m sure that it’s changed since then. Everything. Everything was accurate.

“Look,” she said, as close to begging as someone like Charlie could get. It was more of an appeal to the others than begging. “This woman is my hero. I’ve looked up to her since I first read of her. I always thought she was just fictional, made up. Now that I know she’s a real person…She asked for our help. She wouldn’t do that unless she needs help. We have to give it to her. Please. We have to. That’s what she would do if the roles were reversed. We have to help.”

Dorothy listened to the pleadings of her fiancé with seeming indifference. She stared moodily for a little while before answering begrudgingly, “Fine. For you. But I still don’t trust her.”

Charlie gave her a quick peck.

“Thank you,” she said intimately just to Dorothy. Then to the group, she clapped her hands together, rubbing them together with excitement before saying to the whole group, “So, what do we do now?”

Everyone turned to look at Dean. Assuming his natural role as a leader, he set his beer down on the counter and headed out the door with the other three trailing behind him with various degrees of enthusiasm. 

 

...................................................

 

Hermione sat at the table with one leg crossed over the other, her foot tapping impatiently in the air as she waited for the hunters to finish discussing “important matters.” Which of course meant they were trying to figure out if she was telling the truth. She didn’t blame them. The whole affair was pretty unbelievable after all. The truth is always more fantastic than any lie. 

It was even unbelievable to her. She knew Jo had written the books, but she had never imagined that they would be as popular as they were. It was originally just an idea to help a suffering witch and also take steps of integrating the two communities. No one had any clue that they would grow to be fantastical legends. 

Of course, not everything in the books was right. Certain elements were dramatized, others added, and others removed. For the most part, they were accurate though, although Hermione had always felt that she was more obnoxious than Jo portrayed. And of course, the epilogue was mostly surmising. The last book was released a few years before it was the 2016 epilogue, so Jo went off of what she knew of the present to fabricate a possible future. One that Hermione desperately wished had happened. 

She pushed the thought to the back of her mind. She wasn’t going to think about that. She would get her revenge and then…

She didn’t have an “and then.” She could see no future beyond killing the monster that murdered her family and destroyed her life. And that was okay. She was tired of it all at any rate. There was nothing left once she had her revenge. That was okay too.

The click of the kitchen door opening jolted her out of her thoughts. In strode Dean first, followed by Sam, with the two girls bringing up the rear.

She knew Sam and Dean based off of descriptions she heard from hunters she met along her way. They were widely considered to be the best hunters in the world, although they seemed to make a lot of enemies. Sam was always described as the taller one, and Hermione didn’t quite realize how much taller until she met him. He was about a foot taller than she was, his shaggy hair adding to the Sasquatch look. Dean was slightly shorter and better kempt, at least in appearances. Both boys wore their classic plaid flannels, but Dean had opened his when they got back to the bunker, revealing the black T-shirt beneath. Hermione didn’t recognize either of the girls, although the redhead had known her immediately, obviously a fan of the books. She looked at Hermione with open awe while the other three were more guarded, regarding her with suspicion. Again, she didn’t blame them.

Hermione waited in silence as they took positions facing her at the other end of the table. They all stared at each other for a few moments before Hermione said calmly,

“So are you going to help me or not?”

It was a simple question but contained so much more than it seemed. To answer yes meant that they had accepted her for who she said she was, while to answer no meant they didn’t believe her. She could tell the redhead was on her side, but the others guarded their feelings so well she couldn’t tell what they were thinking. Although based on the brunette’s posture, Hermione figured she probably didn’t believe her. 

The five of them sat in silence, the question weighing heavily in the room. Hermione tried to act casual about it, but underneath she was incredibly anxious. This was her last shot at revenge. These people in front of her were the only ones who could help. If they refused…

She didn’t want to think about it. The possibility of failure did not apply to her. She had to think that way. She had to.

Eventually, the silence was broken.

“Tell us your story first,” Dean demanded, still not letting her know what he was thinking. “The full story. Then we will decide.”

In other words: We still don’t know if we can trust you.

Hermione known in her gut she would probably have to recount her entire story, but she was hoping she wouldn’t have to. Even though she’d retold it to the point where it was more of something from a history textbook than her actual life, she tried never to think about exactly why she needed revenge. It still hurt. She knew it would never stop hurting. She couldn’t see how she could ever get a semblance of happiness back. She was too broken. The demon may not have murdered her that day, but it had still killed her nonetheless.

She took a deep breath, resigning herself, before starting to talk.

“I’m sure you’ve read, or at least heard of the Harry Potter series. You think they’re fictional, made up by Jo Rowling. But that’s not true. Everything written in those books happened, to a certain extent at any rate.

“After the War ended, the Ministry decided that our two worlds needed to be more aware of each other. But it couldn’t happen all at once. That would be chaos. So, they contacted Jo.

“She was picked partly by merit, partly by need, partly by chance. Jo had been a classmate of mine at school. She and Harry had actually been good friends. Of course, she didn’t write that in the books, but he told her more than he often told me and Ron even, especially about his personal life. That’s why she was able to get inside his head so well, she’d known him before. Not only that, but she used to write all the time back in school. She was quite good at it. The Ministry saw that she was doing quite poorly in life. Jo hadn’t been the greatest at magic. Her strengths came from elsewhere. She was incredibly loyal and creative. When she wrote the books, no one knew they would become as popular as they did. This caused some problems, but most of us developed aliases to function in your world. 

“The last book was released before her epilogue. She based it off of current events, but most of it was guessing on her part. None of that ever actually happened. It could have, but your world collided with mine.

“It was a few months ago. Back in summer. We made the kids go to Muggle school to keep up with their English and maths and such. Rose would always be working on school work, but Hugo was more difficult. He was trying to find a way to make his Xbox work in a magical environment. He nearly figured it out too. Kept saying he was about a week away. 

“I always left the kids at home when Ron and I were at work. The kids were always fine. Rose kept Hugo in line and we made sure to set up a few basic babysitting spells. They were perfectly safe under normal circumstances. 

“I got home that day and it was perfectly normal. I changed and started dinner. Ron hadn’t come home yet. I assumed he was working late. Then I called the ids down for dinner. They didn’t answer.

“Then I heard Rose scream.”

Hermione’s voice got tight at this part. She closed her eyes, trying to talk quickly and emotionlessly. Trying just to recount the events and not live through them again. Trying to imagine whiteness and just her words written across her mind so she was reading and not remembering. 

“I ran upstairs but it was too late. They were both dead. Rose and Hugo. It killed them. The demon. Sliced their throats. I didn’t know it was a demon then, not at first. It…it had possessed Ron. He came at me with the knife, backed me against the wall. It had been splattered with blood and I could feel it soaking through my shirt. My children’s blood. The demon called me a bitch, said it was on holiday, and then…it tried to kill me. But I escaped.

“I Apparated away. To the mountains. Right outside Hogwarts. I spent a few days there, still in shock. Learned what the demon was and where it came from. 

“When I finally made contact with my family again, they had buried Rose and Hugo. They didn’t know where Ron was. Ginny said he showed up for the funeral drunk and then disappeared. The demon got what it wanted and discarded him like an old coat. 

“I found Ron eventually. It wasn’t hard, I knew his habits. He told me he was sorry. I knew he was and that it wasn’t his fault, but I still couldn’t bear to look at him. I couldn’t see anything else than those horrible black eyes, that knife. We got divorced. A few weeks after it was finalized, he died. Suicide. He couldn’t take it. I don’t blame him.”

Hermione took a deep breath, forcing her way past the emotions rolling inside of her. Telling herself they didn’t exist, that she was just explaining what happened in another person’s life, not her own. She changed the subject slightly to move past it, trying to keep her voice steady. She opened her eyes at this point, gazing clearly up and meeting Dean’s green ones with absolute conviction. Her gaze never faltered again for the rest of her story.

“I made my way here, found some old hunters’ notebooks in libraries and old houses. Killed a few monsters on my way, some from your world, some from mine. I finally ran into some hunters on a case. I forget their names, and at any rate, I’m sure they used fake ones. I did. I told them I was searching for a demon, one that had killed and ripped apart families in a specific pattern, not just haphazardly like most do. They finally decided they could trust me and told me that the Winchesters specialize in strange cases. Others I met said the same thing, although many seemed as eager to kill the two of you as they did for demons. 

“It wasn’t hard to find you. I knew eventually you would catch the demon’s trail. It came over here a few weeks after I did. I don’t know if that was coincidence or not. But it started killing again. I followed it around, trying to at least clean up the mess it left behind. 

“The way this demon works is that it splits families by just killing some of them. It normally leaves the poor possessed bastard to live to take their own life. Dementors follow in its trail, especially over here. You have quite a problem with them. I suspect this leads to far more depression than there should be otherwise.

“I was just clearing up the latest nest of them when you and her arrived.”

She motioned to Charlie, who was still staring at her intensely with puppy dog enthusiasm, her eyes flooded with a mix of admiration, sympathy, and something else that Hermione couldn’t put her finger on. 

“You know the rest,” she finished with a shrug. She didn’t say anything after that, but the intention was clear: your turn.

For a moment there was complete silence, her story echoing off the sides of the room.

Finally, the brunette girl broke the tension.

“I don’t buy it. You expect us to believe that story? It’s ridiculous. There are too many holes and its just…just absurd.”

With that Hermione snapped. She had been through too much, fought too hard to get here, just to be put down by some slim little woman that she had never heard of. 

“Fine! Don’t believe me.”

She stood up violently, slamming her hands on the table, making it rattle. She leaned over to get closer to the woman. Deliberately, she said,

“You don’t know what it’s like. Running. Always looking you shoulder. And for what? One single goal. One thing that is all that is keeping you alive. You don’t have to lie every single day because if you even told people your real name, you’d be locked up. You haven’t had your family stolen from you after fighting like hell to make a world where they could be safe. You have no idea what it’s like to live in a world where everyone knows who you are but thinks you don’t exist. That you’re made up. That everyone who isn’t part of your world can’t know who and what you actually are because they’d never believe you. That you can never move on because you can’t meet new people and expect them to understand. No, you’re just like everyone else. So fine. Don’t believe me. I’ll deal with this on my own.”

The woman looked startled by Hermione’s speech. Something flickered in her eyes. Realization, almost. No, more like…recognition or understanding. It held an honesty that Hermione rarely saw in people. The woman turned her gaze away, almost embarrassed or ashamed, and spoke quietly, still not looking at Hermione.

“I understand better than most. Like you, I cannot tell people my real name. They would not believe me. My father wrote a book about me when I went missing. It too became more popular than he ever intended. I don’t spend much time in this world because of that. If I told people who I was, they would think I were crazy.”

The redhead moved next to the woman and squeezed her hand consolingly. The woman looked up to meet the other’s eyes, taking a deep breath. Hermione realized that the two were together. It was no wonder the dark haired one didn’t like her when her partner looked at Hermione with such fervor. 

The redhead spoke quietly and privately, but the acoustics of the room picked up on every little sound made, so the rest could hear her comment. The boys pretended not to notice, but Hermione paid attention, trying to learn as much about these people as she could in case it came to a fight. 

“It’s okay, Dorth. It’s okay. We don’t have to stay here long, you know that. But we had to tell Sam and Dean about you know. But we don’t even have to stay here a moment longer if you don’t want to. We still have the key, we can be back in Oz in no time.”

Hermione gave a little start at the word, “Oz.” She of course had read the books when she was little, but she had never imagined that they could be true. The world was more complicated than she had ever known. 

Hearing her noise, the redhead turned to her, eyes shining with indignance.

“Yeah, she’s Dorothy, you got a problem with that?”

Charlie immediately shrank back apologetically, realizing how fierce she sounded. She was about to apologize when Hermione shook her head and smile, telling her silently it was fine.

She learned a while ago if you were understanding to people when they weren’t to you, you could normally get what you wanted.

Dorothy smiled gratefully at her partner and suddenly wrapped her arms around her neck, pulling her in for a kiss. Charlie’s hand went to Dorothy’s hair, pulling her closer. The two seemed completely oblivious to the rest of the room’s occupants. 

Dean awkwardly cleared his throat, causing the girls to disengage themselves, but they kept their hands clasped, smiling slightly at each other in the way that Hermione knew you only did when you were in love. She missed that feeling. But after what happened with Ron…

She pushed it to the back of her mind again. She was constantly doing that. Brooding on what happened and then pushing it down before it came to be too much for her. 

The four facing her shared a look, before Dean finally spoke up, saying,

“We’ll help you. If only because you saved my and Charlie’s lives.”

Hermione let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding.

Sam continued, “We have some spare rooms downstairs. You’re welcome to one if you need a place to stay.”

Hermione nodded gratefully. She brushed her hands on her jeans unconsciously, like one would after working with dirt or dust, as if she were trying to rub the memories off. Trying to act nonchalant, she said, 

“Thank you. But, what I could really use is a drink. Can I grab a glass from a cupboard somewhere?”

Sam pointed her towards the door he and the others came out of. 

“The kitchen is through there. Top left cabinet nearest the fridge.”

Hermione smiled gratefully, nodding wearily, tired from the day’s event and the suppressed emotions. 

“There’s extra sheets around here somewhere,” Dean said, looking around as if they would manifest themselves on a bookshelf. “I’ll try and find them. The rest of you should go sleep. We’ll need all that we can get. Doesn’t sound like this demon is stopping anytime soon.”

With that, the five of them broke, Hermione heading to the kitchen, Sam and the girls down the hall, Dean up the stairs to the archway where Hermione assumed were storage cabinets.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

Hermione was rinsing her glass out in the sink when she heard to door click open and shut behind her. She turned around and saw Dean carrying a bundle of dark blue sheets.

“Finally found them,” he said with a grin. “Still getting used to this place. Don’t know where everything is. Leave it to Sammy to make me find all the shit.”

Hermione stood at the sink awkwardly, not sure what to say. She finished rinsing the glass, then placed it on a towel on the edge of the sink to dry. She never knew what to say in situations like these. And after it happened, she didn’t even like saying much at all. 

Dean leaned against the counter casually, waiting for her to say something. She turned around to face him, just staring at him silently, daring him break his gaze away first, trying to make him feel as uncomfortable as she did. Neither of them took their eyes off each other, the green eyes staring into brown. Neither finding anything because both had walls that protected them. Hermione never took hers down anymore.

“So,” Dean said breaking the silence. “Long day, huh?”

Hermione glared at him. She’d had enough.

“Yeah, I’d say so,” she responded. “After all I saved two people for a bloody dementor attack – you’re NOT welcome, by the way – told I was more or less a liar again by telling the truth, forced to relive the most traumatic experience of my life, still not believed, and even now none of you – who are largely considered to be the best hunters in the world, hunters of demons and ghosts and other assorted crap that I never had to deal with – trust me. My life has been destroyed by things from your world. And even more than that, people out there have told me that it’s probably your fault. That you let in hundreds of thousands of demons into this world. That you caused the bloody apocalypse. That you can’t even stay alive long enough to clean up your shit. That you and that brother of yours are responsible to how my life has gone to hell! And that you are the only people who can help me. Because everything else in my life isn’t fucked up enough, I now have to place my only hopes of justice in the hands of people who–”

Before she could finish, Dean was in front of her. She hadn’t even seen him move but suddenly he was there, standing directly in front of her so that she had to look up to see his face. He still seemed cool and collected, but behind the walls in his eyes was a sort of carnal rage or protective instinct. 

“Look,” he said, his voice careful and measured. “I know the past few months haven’t been a cakewalk for you, but that’s life. Crap happens. You shove it down and keep moving. Find someone to blame if it makes you feel better, I don’t care. But what happened is not mine and Sam’s fault.”

His expression softened somewhat as Hermione’s eyes grew wide for an instant then quickly returned to their narrowed state. It was a small slip on her part, but enough for Dean to realize that she was hurting more than she would ever let on.

“I am sorry for what’s happened. Believe me. I try to keep this stuff from happening. When you’re in this line of work…you’re not gonna save everyone. You’re not gonna hold the bad guys off forever. I’ve messed up. I’ve made some really bad mistakes and they’ve ended up hurting people. But damn it if I don’t go out of this world having done more good than harm. And we are going to help you.”

He stepped back slightly and Hermione closed her eyes, taking a deep breath in slowly, trying to control her emotions. She hadn’t meant to snap like that. Sometimes her emotions came up from shoving them down and well…

When she opened her eyes, she saw that Dean still hadn’t moved much from in front of her, just barely enough so that she could no longer feel his breath on her face. She took another deep breath and started to say,

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have attacked you like that. It’s just, with everything that’s–”

And she was cut off again. Dean had stepped back in towards her, closer than even when he yelled at her. Her breath caught in the back of her throat as he leaned down and kissed her, his hand going to the back of her head to angle her better up to him, getting it tangled in her hair.

For a moment, Hermione stood shocked, not reciprocating but not pulling away either. Just saying still, neutral. Then Dean wrapped his other hand around her waist, holding her just at the small of her back. He pulled her in closer to him and she sighed into him, giving into the feeling. 

She hardly knew what was happening, but she didn’t care. All she knew was that it felt good. She hadn’t been kissed like this in months, maybe even years, she couldn’t remember. She reached her hands up around his neck, steadying herself against him, deepening the kiss. He responded almost immediately to her, moving his hand from her hair down her back, tracing her spine lightly. She shuddered, coming up for breath quickly, then pulling him back down to her.

Dean was holding her closely now, one hand between her shoulders, the other right above her waist, drawing her into him, their hips touching. He kissed her again and again, wet and firm, each kiss deeper than the last. Hermione let out a small moan as she let herself completely give in, closing her eyes and tilting her head back as Dean moved down her throat, kissing the bottom of her neck before making his way back up to her mouth, pressing his lips softly against hers. She kissed him back harder, hardly knowing what she was doing. 

It was strange kissing Dean in a way. It was so full of passion and animal instinct, yet there was something gentle behind it too. Like he would push her right up to the brink but pull her back before she could fall over the edge. That only made her want to jump over, pulling him with her. 

Hermione reached on hand up to the back of Dean’s head, running her fingers through his hair, bringing the other around to grab at his shirt collar, yanking him further down to her. He slid his hands up and down her spine expertly, almost teasing her in a way. She finally couldn’t take it any longer and wrapped her legs around his waist. He automatically supported her while kissing her over and over again. She was higher than him now, and he reached a hand up to pull her down to him, still keeping her supported against his waist. 

He spun her around, pushing her onto the counter. A beer bottle crashed to the floor, shattering, but neither of them recognized it. She doubted either of them even noticed it. She kept her legs wrapped around him, but let them loosen and uncross, allowing the counter to support her weight. The small of her back pressed against the wall for an instant before Dean slid her forward towards him, her waist pressing against his. Both of her hands were in his hair now, one of his in hers, the other on the back of her neck. She angled herself up to him, kissing him as she brought him closer to her. Dean gently bit her bottom lip as he kissed her, and she moaned again, letting herself go even farther, no longer away of anything but the two of them in that moment. 

Taking her moan as encouragement, Dean pushed her against the wall, not quite violently, but certainly not gently. He steadied himself with one hand against the wall, the other still in her hair as she ran her hands across his back, feeling every muscle tighten and release as he bent over her, pulling her up to him but keeping her against the wall. He pushed his pelvis against hers, causing her heart rate to increase. She moaned again, feeling her heart thumping on the inside of her chest, her breathing growing faster. 

Dean backed off slightly, pulling his hand away from the wall so he was no longer leaning over her, but Hermione reached her hands to his neck, pulling him down again so that he had no choice but to balance himself on back of the counter. He pulled her away from the wall once again, bringing her to him as his hands moved from her hair back down to her back. Pulling herself even closer, she balanced herself half on the counter, half on his waist. He shifted to support her, one hand on her waist, the other pressed between her shoulder blades, keeping her held against him. She pressed herself harder against him, wrapping her legs tightly around his waist, but keeping them uncrossed as he mimicked her movement by pulling her in closer to him. She could feel his heart racing too, perfectly in time with hers. 

Then, Dean slid his hand from her back around to her thigh, sliding it up in a way that only ever meant one thing. She snapped her eyes open as she flew back to reality and abruptly pulled away from him, pushing her hands against his chest. She dropped her gaze from his surprised one, keeping her hands on his chest to hold him at a distance.

“No,” she whispered, staring at the ground.

“What?”

Dean still stood between her legs, his face inches from hers. Hermione stared defiantly back up at him, meeting his gaze without blinking.

“I said ‘No.’ I’m not some whore that you can bang and then toss out the front door,” she said unwaveringly, her accent prominent. “You are going to help me kill a demon and then that’s all.”

She pushed him away hard, causing him to stumble backwards. She slid gingerly off the counter, careful not to step on any broken bits of glass. She gathered the sheets from where they lay on the floor. She didn’t even remember Dean dropping them. She could feel his eyes on her as she headed towards the door.

“But…”

“‘But’ what?” she asked, spinning angrily back around to face him, her eyes blazing with a thousand different emotions. “‘But I’m different?’‘But that was never your intention?’‘But this means something?’” 

She laughed a little, but it held no humor, just a cruel irony. 

“You forget, Dean Winchester, that I read those books. I know how you’ve treated every female you’ve ever met. I know how you treat women. You sleep with them, and then you throw them aside. Have you ever stopped to think what happened to a lot of those girls? Most of them died. Because they knew you. Because monsters found them, and killed them, just for the fun of it. Because they had a connection to you.” 

She brushed a tear away angrily. She hated when she started crying when she was mad. 

“Well, that’s not me. I am not some slut you found at a strip club. I am not some easy chick that’ll entertain you for a night. You have one purpose to me. One. You’re going to help me find that demon. And then you and I, we’re never going to see each other again. Ever. Because while I don’t value my life, I am not going to die because some monster thought it would be fun to kill me because I knew you.”

And she stormed out of the kitchen, leaving Dean behind to clean up a pile of broken glass and spilled beer.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so I haven't been updating this recently cause of school and I'm working on an original novel and stuffs but don't worry, I'm planning to come back to this midDecember-Januaryish (2014/2015). I've got stuff planned, I am coming back to this


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